Homeschool Headlines August 8, 2014

This is my first year doing home school.  Before we got going, I researched and read and asked questions and Googled to my hearts content about the who, what, when, where, why, and most importantly how people do school at home. I found a group of homeschool parents in my new county, which helped my confidence a lot. I asked a close friend of mine for details of every book in her eclectic curriculum and researched almost all of them so that I could pick and choose some for my own....and then I dove in.
I think EVERY book I read on the subject of home schooling said that most people who decide to homeschool will make the mistake of planning too much to fit into each day or week or what-have-you. I thought I had it perfect. I was going to be flexible with times and just go with the flow of what my children could handle each day---surely the 4 or 5 things I had planned would be finished with plenty of time for playing and laughing and enjoying our family time, right? Wrong.
I still have the books and curriculum extras collecting dust on a shelf currently and I do still plan to use them eventually, but I have ended up using a prepackaged curriculum from the book store filled with worksheets as my Core for now.  We read at every chance we get. I can get up to 50 books at once from the amazing library here in Port Charlotte so that helps tremendously! Other than that, I try to go with what my kids are interested in.
I have 2 daughters, Olivia, almost 7 and Carly, almost 5, and 1 son, Korbin,  almost 2. Olivia is the only one ~legally~ in home school right now. Korbin is our biggest distraction. We have to fit in most of our worksheets during his naptime. Carly is eager to learn but just not quite ready for some of the reading and writing exercises I try to do with her, so she will hopefully be starting preschool this month. In Colorado, Olivia went to preschool for several years and to Kindergarten at a Charter School that we loved. I think Carly will thrive with some similar peer play time. 
Right now, Olivia is very interested in rocks and volcanoes so that is what we are studying. It's nice that there are full episodes of 'Bill Nye the Science Guy' on YouTube. We've done the obligatory baking soda and vinegar volcano sculpture already and I plan to do a few more activities to show the parts of Earth and some salt crystal projects as well. Shark Week is this month on t.v. so we got a Great White 3D model to put together when the time comes and then we will use a few of the t.v. programs to homeschool. How fun is that?! We also just found a plethora of tiny tree frog tadpoles in our kiddie pool, so, why not?! Bring on the metamorphosis lesson as well!
My sons birthday is close to the last week of this month and we plan to go to Dinosaur Park in Plant City, FL so we will have a dinosaur study week around that time too. The girls are excited about dinosaurs as well, having recently been allowed to watch all 3 movies in the Jurassic Park series.
Lots of questions, lots of books, and lots of Googling and YouTubing for answers around here! And the best part is that I find myself learning a lot too. Jean has successfully mastered telling time and is easing her way into counting money (coins) currently as well.
I strongly encourage all readers to post any comments or questions you may have. Thank you so much for reading, supporting, and encouraging this chronicling of my CRAZY DAYS!